I
had acustomerthe other daythat PCwaspractically dead, because
theyclickedon one of thosepop-upads whileon
somesketchywebsite.Somethingwas downloadedand their computeris infected withmalware andwouldnot
load properly.If you tryto log
on toWindows, they kept getting
anerror, such

Luckily, Microsoft released a cool offline version of
Windows Defender that scans your system outside of Windows and removes any
infections. Then you can start up your computer and the malware will be gone
and hopefully your system will start up normally! That’s pretty cool and definitely
better than having to reinstall everything.

Once you download the 32 or 64-bit version, run
the program and you’ll see the welcome screen:

Go
ahead and click Next to get started creating the offline media. Once you accept
the license agreement, you’ll be given the option to install Windows Defender
Offline on a CD/DVD, USB flash drive, or to download an ISO file.

I
installed it on a flash drive, which will have to be reformatted in order to
install Windows Defender Offline. You only need about 250 MB of free space on
the flash drive, but it will still format the entire thing.

Click
Next and the process will start. It will download, then process the files, then
format the USB drive and then install the files.

Once
it’s complete, you will see the instructions for how to use the new media:

Now
you can boot up using the media and you’ll get the familiar Windows Defender
screen. Note that all the definition files are downloaded when you use the
install tool. You don’t need an Internet connection or anything in order to
update the definition files. If you need to run the tool again at a later time,
you need to create the media again because it will download the latest files
and then create the bootable media.

Hopefullythe next timeyou
have a problemwithyour computer
and youknow thatspywareor malware, you can use theofflinetool todisinfectyour system. If you have questionsorproblems usingthe tool, feel free topost
a comment! Have fun!